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Credit Where Credit is Due, part II.

Well, I was on a roll yesterday dealing with big companies.

My next email went to a company with a business ezine I get daily and had been trying for weeks to change the email address. That ought to be pretty simple, but every time I clicked on the link in the ezine, then filled out the form on the web, my computer just chugged and chugged a while, then a page would come up saying the database was down.

Now this is a HUGE company. I understand these glitches happen, and if it was only for a few days, I wouldn’t have thought anything about it. But I tried for weeks to get my email address changed, and the same thing happened over and over.

Finally, about 9 days ago I sent an email to their customer service department to see what they'd say. An autoresponder sent an email right back with a link for an online “ticket” to check on the progress. Well, every time I checked it had the same message --- "not viewed". After 9 days? I think they’d better get some more help!

Being totally fed up with the situation, I decided if I couldn't get my email changed, I’d see what happened if I tried to unsubscribe. Well! That went through immediately.

I can’t imagine a company would really want to make it easier to flat out unsubscribe than to change your email and keep getting their messages and ads. So I sent an email to the head honcho of the company and told him all that had happened, commenting that the whole situation seemed to me a good way to lose customers when they want to keep them.

Evidently they agreed. I don't suppose it was 5 minutes before I got an email from the Managing Editor, thanking me for letting them know about the problem. She informed me she was going to talk to the Customer Service Manager and see what was going on, and thanked me yet again for making her aware of the problem, and if I had any other concerns please let her know. All right!

But I wasn’t finished (I told you I was on a roll). Then I sent an email to yet another company asking them to take a charge off my credit card I didn't think I'd made. I thought the offer I signed up for had a free 30-day trial, and it did, but evidently one of the things I thought was a bonus wasn’t, and that was what the charge was for. That’s me, confused as usual!

However, they were VERY nice, helped me right away without argument, saying they’d take the charge off my credit card. I sent them a second email thanking them for such great customer service, and they sent me yet another email thanking me for thanking them.

Giving credit where credit is due, the count is one company with lousy service, one with problems they seemed unaware of but willing to fix them, and one that it was probably my fault for not reading the fine print better, but they cheerfully refunded my money without the slightest fuss.

Now, who do you think I'll do business with again??? And why can't "big business" figure out good service means happy customers means they keep their business and make more money!???!!

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